Marche Barbes

A veritable souk, this noisy, crowded food market is permeated with the aromas of many spices and fresh veggies. Melons are cut open to reveal ripe flesh, Stacks of asparagus and fresh tomotoes share space with red and yellow bell peppers. Fruit is stacked everywhere and indeed fresh fruit out-numbers fresh vegetables about 2 to 1. You can also find a lot of non-food items at marche's en francais as you will see from the pictures below. These goods ALL appear to be of lower quality so I stayed away from them ... no need for them as well.


And the metro thunders overhead which means everyone has to raise their voices just a little to be heard. You can see the Metro above from my wide angle lens shots. I went early so everyone was just setting up, the food was still neatly stacked and there were very few people ... I picked up my loot and came home and then headed out again and by that time the market was wall to wall shoppers.


As usual in Paris beggars and shady looking characters offer clandestine merchandise between the stalls and on the way into the small openings into the market. Needless to say my camera was viewed with suspicion so I had to sneak in shots of people although some merchants co-operated especially if I bought something from them.


I of course buy too much stuff forgetting that I am alone in this wonderful city. How about 4-5 cheeses, fresh eggs, a couple of breads, dried fruit for my oatmeal in the morning ( have to somehow find a way to get this glue to taste good you know ), a small slice of pate de Lapin, fresh apple juice and of course .... a Bloc de Fois Gras d'Oie avec Morceaux .... Actually I picked up a selection of Pate's including some Fois Gras but a huge variety as you can see ( picture above ). A veritable cornucopia of little delights to munch on with a fresh baguette. I'm not sure what is worse for my diet ... the fois gras or the bread I spread it on to eat it. I think maybe both??? But I have 14 people coming to visit later this month and into July and I have to test everything to make sure it doesn't disappoint. A dirty job but someone has to do it. Notice that I did NOT buy any tarts or sweets. I have some discipline you know!!!!!


I also bought some real live wild strawberries that actually tasted like strawberries and of course ate them all immediately... the whole damn box. And I found a small bag of 'Fleur de Sel' from the Ile de Re... the one I choose was mixed with Herbes de Provence. I had bought some tomotoes yesterday and the fleur de Sel was quite spectacular with them. I know, I know, I shouldn't be eating a lot of salt either.


One of the things I swore I would do while living in Paris was to have fresh flowers in my apartment. Problem is I can't find a cheap vase to put them in yet and since I have to leave it behind I don't want an expensive one. So instead I bought a plant. You can see it below the Canadian flag in the picture above.


One of the things I did not buy was any fish. It looks really really good but I think I'm going to wait until others arrive and then we can experiment with the poisson.


A successful trip to the market if I do say so myself.


Now before you start in on me about my weight with respect to the foie Gras d'Oie etc. I also bought a scale today and am the exact weight from the night before I left. (stark naked mind you) Not bad given the meals in Lithuania. All this walking is paying off. NOT losing any weight but all the walking allows me to enjoy the foods I like the most.


Also notice that I started to experiment with my lenses. I used a fish eye lens for some pictures since I don't have my wide angle lens with me ( Laura please arrange to have someone bring this over ) and I also used my LensBaby lens which as a very wide depth of field so things get out of focus around the subject very quickly. I wasn't pleased with the Lens Baby pictures so will have to learn to use it.


Also people have been e-mailing me asking how to leave comments on the Blog ... I have no idea so if you can't figure it out please e-mail me comments instead. My e-mail address while in Europe is autoguruineurope@gmail.com ... I look forward to hearing from everyone ... keep in touch so that I don't do crazy.


Life is good .... Enjoy


Auto Guru in Europe

ps. What happened to Vancouver last night ... they may let this thing slip away if they are not careful.